Chongqing hotpot base is available at most Asian markets.
It’s made to be a hot pot soup base, but is easily portioned and soluble so you can throw your desired amount of that brick(1x1 cm cross-section is a good start) into any hot dish you’re cooking and mix in as much spicy, savory complex flavor as you like.
It’s my favorite cooking ingredient. Has at least a dozen complementary spices mixed in, stores indefinitely, can be added to any savory dish, many portions, inexpensive, and is easy to adjust to taste.
It is the bessst.
Mine are set in beef tallow too, so you’re in the right camp by my reckoning.
I make sure mine are chongqing flavor because those are the ones including Sichuan peppercorn, 麻椒, the numbing pepper.
The pale white seafood blocks are also good for people who don’t like spiciness, same principle but a more mellow seafood stock rather than punch you in your face flavor town, which is my personal jam.